Battle for the soul of the MP3 phone

Wednesday 26 October 2005 07.37 EDT
First published on Wednesday 26 October 2005 07.37 EDT

Wired has a long article by by Frank Rose about music on mobiles, and in particular, the conflict around the Motorola ROKR/Apple iTunes phone. The intro says:

Consumers want an iPod phone that will play any song, anytime, anywhere. Just four little problems: the cell carriers, the record labels, the handset makers, and Apple itself. The inside story of why the ROKR went wrong.* (*And what it will take to make a truly rocking music phone.)

But the crux of the story is the same old thing that many people have been saying for years:

Which brings us back to Apple. In the end, what's surprising about the Moto ROKR is not that carriers resisted it but that it is so short on innovation. Instead of creating new possibilities, as the [Nokia] N91 does, the ROKR allows FairPlay to close them off. Why won't Apple open iTunes by licensing FairPlay to a wide range of manufacturers? "That's a good question for Steve Jobs," replies Alberto Moriondo, a Motorola executive who helped lead the development of the ROKR. (Jobs declined to be interviewed for this story.) Another handset person says he asked the same question in a meeting with Apple execs, only to have them roll their eyes and mutter, "If only …"

Jobs' refusal to license FairPlay is reminiscent of his refusal to license the Macintosh operating system to other hardware manufacturers back in the '80s - a key factor in the Mac's dismal 2.5% market share today. Over time, open standards inevitably win out. "If Apple continues to rely on a proprietary architecture," says Clayton Christensen, Harvard Business School professor and author of The Innovator's Dilemma, "the iPod will likely become a niche product." Anyone doubting that need only consider that Microsoft is licensing its DRM to all comers, at prices that are hard to refuse.